World of Ashes Read Online Free Page A

who lived there was at least a little overweight because nothing fit either of them without having to poke new holes in a belt.
    The kitchen was like something out of a magazine, and if the magazine covers framed on the walls were any indication, it was. The refrigerator still put out ice and cold water, and they took a moment to eat a magnificently prepared chicken salad that was in a container marked Monday, four days ago. Out in the garage, along with a brand new Dodge Ram 1500, was a corner devoted to farming, hunting and equestrian pursuits. Keith found the tiger striped fatigues the man had used for deer hunting to be a better fit for them both, even if forty year old tiger striped camouflage was just a bit goofy looking.
                  "We look like South Vietnamese ARVN’s.” Keith joked, pulling out two boony hats. He tossed one to Ethan, the wide brimmed hats would be good for keeping ash and falling particles off their faces. The sun was already nearly gone, dropping the global temperatures drastically.
                  "Give it ten minutes and these will look as bad as our Multicams." The inside of the truck still smelled of rich leather and pine. Ethan had to hand it to the previous owner. The man had had taste, assuming the past tense since no one was home.
                  “I just thought of something funny.” Keith said before Ethan started the truck.
                  “What?”
                  “Before the Multicam uniform the Army issued ACU’s. They were grayish blue and white and blended into absolutely nothing…. And now the world ends, and everything is gray and white… and the uniform is long retired.”             
                  "I try not to remember those shit-fuck rags." Ethan sighed. "History will note the original Army Combat Uniform as an abysmal failure caused by the Army’s hard-on for copying every the Marines already did, only poorly. But you are right." He started the truck, grateful yet again that the man had been so well-to-do he could afford a $40,000 truck with an automatic transmission and a full tank of $8 a gallon gas. The garage door opened and in front of them stood the man who had owned the house, the horse, and the truck. His chest was ripped open, a pace maker dangling in a stream of blackened, gooey snot that swung from his exposed ribs. There was a child's arm in his hand, gnawed to the bone. The child he had mostly eaten stood behind him, a good portion of her face gnawed away. The poor thing was completely naked, a rubber ducky in her remaining hand and mud that had hardened all around her where the ash had collected on the blood.
    The child dropped the rubber ducky and Ethan slammed the accelerator down. They plowed the two of them under with an incred ible whump sound. Despite the initial adrenaline dump, hitting the two zombies kept the truck under better control by giving them traction on the ash. The truck wound through the back roads at a snail’s pace until Ethan found Old Highway 100. By then the truck was filthy, but the roads weren’t as bad and they could actually do the posted speed limit if there was nothing blocking their path.
    A n Army roadblock sat atop a plateau where the road curved around a steeply sloped farm and an old barn with a massive flag pole in the middle of the yard. The garrison flag at the top was tattered and faded, barely visible through the warm, gray faux snow. No one was left to lower it, and no anarchist scumbags had yet to cut it down. There were no trucks at the roadblock, no soldiers or FEMA workers either, just a few infected people looking the other direction in a cattle coral off to one side. Disturbing reminders that the Government had once been jailing people for euthanizing zombies littered the countryside. For a brief time the government had then gone to trying to jail the zombies themselves. The result had been much the same as